Xanthe Bowater - Wave Wellness

17-year-old Xanthe was wide-eyed and not sure of much, except for the fact that university wasn't for her and she couldn't get enough of being on the ocean. Fast-forward to 2025 and approaching my 30th birthday, I can see how the decisions that naïve and boisterous teen made have shaped me as a person, introduced me to the people who mean the most to me, and given me over a decade in a fulfilling and rewarding career. 

It hasn't all been "sunshine on the Amalfi coast" and "limitless budgets for glitzy parties" - there's been my fair share of cleaning toilet bowls with Q-tips, weeks at sea without contact to the outside world (yes - I was in yachting before Starlink!), and drying tears off my cheeks in the pantry before pasting on a smile and heading out to perform silver service for 14 guests - but I've loved it!

I started as an ambitious kiwi girl who had a strong competitive sailing background and a drive to work on deck, eventually wanting to become a captain (spoiler: I did actually achieve this one!). Back in 2014 it was a lot tougher for girls to get on deck, with little in the way of the supportive communities we have online today. After a few comments from captains and other crew such as "you're a girl - you will never need to know how to service winches", I decided to suck it up and go down the interior route, eventually running my own interior on a number of boats (always sailing yachts and often promoted to watch leader for ocean passages). I loved it. 

But all of that came after a sexual assault in my first few years onboard that broke me into a million pieces - and eventually taught me that I can rebuild myself. I won't go into the heavy details of it here, but I was only 19 years old and on the other side of the world to all of my family and friends. Talk about needing resilience. 

I bottled things up, kept on keeping on and charged through the next 3 years as if nothing ever happened... and then the wheels finally came flying off. 

After a year onboard a vessel with a captain who was bullying and manipulating me, my mind took a very dark turn down a road of anxious and depressive thoughts. The only option I had was going home to work it all out. I flew back to New Zealand and booked myself into therapy for the first time ever and at the time, I felt like I had failed. 

Fast forward three restorative years on kiwi soil, rebuilding my mind, and I went back to yachting - this time with a game plan for my wellbeing and a better understanding of what my boundaries looked like. That's when it hit me: so many of my friends on other yachts were facing the same struggles I had - isolation, bullying, personal pressures, stress, burnout - and the outcome was all too familiar.

So there started "WaveWellness Solutions": a crew-centric employee Assistance Program that provides vessels with wrap-around wellbeing support for everyone onboard - not just in emergencies. It was my answer to the wellbeing crisis I was watching unfold. I never intended it to be a career change as such; I just wanted to see if there was something I could do to help my friends from going through the same hell I had survived. 

But here I am two years on, having stepped back from life onboard (slowly - with a few deliveries and freelance gigs every year for good measure!) and getting to make a real difference to my fellow crew mates onboard. 

What began as a passion project has evolved into a business that I never could have imagined at 19. WaveWellness now partners with yachts, management companies, and industry leaders to provide preventative, confidential wellbeing support to crew worldwide - a quiet safety net, running in the background of yacht life - something that could save careers or even lives.

Although I miss being on the ocean, my "crew" look a little different these days, instead of the grumpy engineers, kind chefs, and energetic deckies, I have a team of other ex-yachties who are now therapists, dieticians, yoga teachers and financial advisors, who are helping me change the shadowy side of an industry we all love. 

The hours are still long (entrepreneurship, it turns out, isn’t exactly a nine-to-five), but the purpose feels bigger. Yachting taught me everything I know about resilience, attention to detail, and teamwork. I learned how to communicate under pressure, how to lead through chaos, and how to read a room - whether that room was a guest table, a tense crew mess or more recently a board room full of change-makers. Those skills have been invaluable in building a business.

But more than that, yachting taught me empathy. The best crew are those who see the human side of the job - and that, I’ve learned, is what truly carries over into life on shore.

If you’re thinking about leaving yachting - or even just wondering what else might be out there - my biggest advice is this: you don’t lose your identity when you step off the boat. You evolve it.

The world beyond the passerelle is waiting for the kind of people who can problem-solve in a storm, multitask with grace, and connect with others across cultures and chaos. It’s okay to be scared - I was terrified. But you owe it to yourself to see what else you’re capable of.

I’ll always be that girl who fell in love with the ocean, but now I get to help others stay afloat in different ways. Life ashore has its own tides - and I’ve learned that just because you step off the boat doesn’t mean you leave the sea behind. It’s in you, always.

So here’s to every crew member charting their next course -  may it be steady, fulfilling, and truly your own.

Want to check out Wave Wellness? Head to https://www.wavewellnesss.com/ to see more.